tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post9182648861953079107..comments2016-07-20T17:05:17.221+02:00Comments on Pocas palabras: 5 most common international DJing mistakesIvica Anteskinoreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-74824330381693374272016-04-19T11:52:17.849+02:002016-04-19T11:52:17.849+02:00When I organised an encuentro, we started with our...When I organised an encuentro, we started with our &quot;dream list&quot; of DJs we knew well from personal experience as reliably playing high quality sets that were a bit different from each other (suited to particular slots on different days and times). Then we considered travel costs and availability. Finally we chose one DJ who was a bit more of a risk, but would attract his own crowd in a way that we particularly wanted. It was more of a risk because he&#39;s not normally the guy for that kind of event and not all of us had so much personal experience with him. That worked out fairly well but had flaws. If I did the same process again this year I would start from a slightly different &quot;dream&quot; list because my opinion about some people&#39;s experience and reliability has changed.<br /><br />However, basically we started from our own experience of hearing all the DJs and dancing to their music. For the second and third editions (in which I didn&#39;t organise, but did have a little bit of input into the DJ discussions), people tried the networking thing, but it was never going to make much difference because we were always going purely on our experience of their music, not on who approached us.<br /><br />There are certain slots for which we would have considered or did consider DJs without international experience, but with good experience DJing different milongas in the UK.<br /><br />I entirely agree that there are relatively well-known names who do not reliably play high quality music; my belief is that they get the gigs because neither they nor the organisers have enough personal experience of anything better. (I have nothing but respect for people being good at marketing or networking).msHedgehoghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05719152265628932122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-45790337944068949242016-04-06T00:15:52.307+02:002016-04-06T00:15:52.307+02:00Exactly my point :) genius is in the simplicity, c...Exactly my point :) genius is in the simplicity, connection is everything - just like in the dance ;)Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-81412005616982425742016-04-04T21:06:34.163+02:002016-04-04T21:06:34.163+02:00Interesting point about tiredness and musical ener...Interesting point about tiredness and musical energy. I was at a wonderful set last year - the final set in a three-day encuentro. It started relatively gently, but certainly not with slow music, and built up. A friend of mine said that he came in, very tired, and thinking that he would mostly sit and listen. But then he thought &quot;oh, I can dance to this&quot;, and he did. And then after that, the next tanda, &quot;Oh, now I can dance to this&quot; ... and so on. And the floor was full to the end of the last milonga after 24 hours of dancing and 12 hours of sleep. I calculated that couldn&#39;t possibly have danced less than 18 out of the total 24 hours. It really was pretty impressive. And this DJ is exactly as as you describe; fundamentally he&#39;s a &quot;top 400&quot; kind of DJ, but it&#39;s the way he puts them on at the right time and in the right order, and obviously knows that he doesn&#39;t need to impress anybody. Tanda after tanda that seems really simple when you write it down, but at the time seems like pure genius.msHedgehoghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05719152265628932122noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-2569161937973383622016-04-04T05:25:04.036+02:002016-04-04T05:25:04.036+02:00;);)Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-39119167892323102782016-04-04T05:24:25.660+02:002016-04-04T05:24:25.660+02:00Samuel, you are touching here one interesting ques...Samuel, you are touching here one interesting question - what are the criteria of the organizers when they chose their DJs? In my opinion they have to make balance between quality DJs and ones that bring people to their event aka big names (which not nececerily are the ones who play good music).Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-66648747391047847412016-04-04T05:21:22.151+02:002016-04-04T05:21:22.151+02:00I do this check myself also... but very often DJ c...I do this check myself also... but very often DJ can not do much, specialy if the quality of the system is bad - and this is why this point is not in my post. Anyway, thank you for the comment.Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-40034860339617807332016-04-04T02:44:23.858+02:002016-04-04T02:44:23.858+02:00Good! ;)Good! ;)Paola NociTangohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17638038680073937009noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-78376034794249625892016-04-04T01:51:33.912+02:002016-04-04T01:51:33.912+02:00Finally, an objective appraisal of what often happ...Finally, an objective appraisal of what often happens with the DJing at tango events. Agree with all points.<br /><br />Many of the &quot;popular&quot; DJs are good at networking and not so good at DJing for the dancers in attendance. As you mentioned, they try to be &quot;different&quot;, or even worse, sometimes try to &quot;educate&quot; the audience about obscure, hard-to-dance-to music.<br /><br />Yet they are often praised, in the manner of &quot;The Emperor&#39;s New Clothes&quot; story - very few people want to admit, or at least say publicly that the DJing sucked.<br /><br />The &quot;slowing down&quot; concept is especially annoying. When I hear a great DJ, I want to keep dancing even if I&#39;m tired, because the music is compelling me to do so.<br /><br />To have better tango events (better = truly enjoyed by the paying attendees) we need more realistic evaluations of them, including the DJing.Samuelhttps://me.yahoo.com/a/nZS2yYwMjMd92I663a16IspfvIxq6BlUDmyszgI-noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-55726458380286365872016-04-04T01:04:59.494+02:002016-04-04T01:04:59.494+02:00Excellent, I agree with everything that it is said...Excellent, I agree with everything that it is said here, but I would like to add another point... Check how the sound is around the dancefloor! I have seen it a couple of times when the DJ is all happy DJing in his pedestral and I am struggling to hear the music on the other side of the room... It&#39;s not all about the music selection, is also how the music gets to the dancer&#39;s ears. And although that is also an error on the organizer (maybe just putting two speakers instead of four) it is the DJ that has to make sure that the sound is appropriate around the dancefloor. I usually walk around a few times around the dance floor and I also have a few &quot;scouts&quot; who I sometimes engage on a little cabeceo with my finger pointing to my ear... Works well!koolrickyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12322560350770527634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-32119741185052067512016-04-03T16:28:21.353+02:002016-04-03T16:28:21.353+02:00I could not agreed more with you: when you have co...I could not agreed more with you: when you have connection, you have tango! Unfortunately many people forget this in their dance, specially.Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-71086619375792081872016-04-03T16:25:31.690+02:002016-04-03T16:25:31.690+02:00Yes, it is good to have these things in mind alway...Yes, it is good to have these things in mind always, but I think there is a bigger responsibility for a bigger event, and therefore - a slightly different aproach. I will try the following period to write a post about the differences between DJ&#39;s aproach to local vs international milonga.Ivica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-52274760453748770982016-04-03T16:21:44.657+02:002016-04-03T16:21:44.657+02:00Thank you Felicity... About the speed of the music...Thank you Felicity... About the speed of the music - please, have in mind that it is much harder to dance to slow music, than it is to faster oneIvica Anteskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14399806678128316938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-17597862828007849912016-04-02T04:06:22.799+02:002016-04-02T04:06:22.799+02:00Tango is a dance of connection - love your stateme...Tango is a dance of connection - love your statement about the DJ dancing with the dancers. <br /><br />If you&#39;re more focused on showing off and less concerned about connecting with the dancers - both on &amp; off the dance floor, it&#39;s like followers practicing fancy embellishments or leaders dry humping figures - call it &quot;tango masturbation&quot;; call it what you will. <br /><br />But, when you have connection, you have tango. It may be elusive, and there are no hard and fast rules, as this post points out. As the Supreme Court justice put it when asked for his definition of pornography, &quot;I know it when I see it.&quot;John Changhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16091422581253926381noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-38903043809507004292016-04-02T00:37:10.740+02:002016-04-02T00:37:10.740+02:00I agree. Good advice. But these mistakes are not l...I agree. Good advice. But these mistakes are not limited to international events, so I think the advice should not be either.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08546555586986008873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4487124117537944724.post-37945583968081368712016-04-01T17:12:03.310+02:002016-04-01T17:12:03.310+02:00&quot; You do not have to be different, do not try...&quot; You do not have to be different, do not try to be better, you do not have to play pieces of music others do not have, do not be original, you do not have to play something they forgot to. &quot;<br />Agreed.<br /><br /> &quot;The right time usually is when the tanda came in to your mind.&quot;<br />Agreed.<br /><br />&quot; People come to these events and they want to dance, you do not have to surprise them with special music...Please, do not screw up the international events for testing your ideas&quot;<br />Agreed.<br /><br />&quot;nothing drains the mood of the milonga more than slow&quot; Disagreed. &quot;and passionless music.&quot; Agreed.<br /><br />&quot;I hate to see a DJ&#39;s face glowing from the bright light of the screen of his laptop&quot; <br />Agreed.<br /><br />:) So nice to hear these things. <br />PS - Lovely blog name.Felicityhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04969848804658804269noreply@blogger.com